


Seasons of My Life

by GotTheSilver



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Coda, F/M, M/M, Post-Avengers: Endgame (Movie)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-27
Updated: 2019-04-27
Packaged: 2020-02-07 12:18:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,961
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18620488
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GotTheSilver/pseuds/GotTheSilver
Summary: post Endgame coda, so spoilers.





	Seasons of My Life

**Author's Note:**

> heavy spoilers for Endgame.
> 
> set 12 years post movie.
> 
> title stolen from fleetwood mac.

She always knew her dad had been special; the fleeting memories she has of him from childhood are of a smile, laughing, his scratchy beard on her face, and those things are special to a kid. But then there’s other things she remembers. Bright lights and her dad’s hands moving with confidence. Grease and tools and overhearing him saying words she didn’t understand at the time.

Morgan keeps the helmet on her bedside table. It makes her feel better, most days.

*

Happy tells her stories that she’s pretty sure are censored because Uncle Rhodey’s stories are a million times worse. But she likes it; likes knowing her dad was a whole person, that he lived an entire life before he made the choice to have her.

It’s what everyone keeps telling her, always. That her dad wanted her. That he made the choice to have her. That he made the choice he did to save her.

*

It’s twelve years since he died, and the city does a thing each year. Honoring him, and Natasha, and Steve. They show footage from the battle, and her mom goes into the city to make a speech.

Morgan stays at home with Happy and Uncle Rhodey and watches it on tv every year.

“Why don’t you go?” she asks Uncle Rhodey. “You could tell them—”

“The only person I want to talk about Tony with is you, kiddo.”

“I’m a teenager, Uncle Rhodey.”

“I know,” he says with a mock grimace. “And I remember your dad at your age, why do you think I’m sticking so close?”

Morgan grins and elbows him in the side, before grabbing a cheeseburger from the pile on the table that Happy brings every year, and taking a big bite. There’s some new footage being shown on the television this year, and Morgan frowns. “What’s this?”

“Looks like footage from the tower,” Happy says. “When the team were all there, before Ultron. Your mom must’ve let them have it.”

“I’ve never—” Morgan pauses, watching the way her dad is looking at Steve, she’s seen that look before, in all the footage from her mom and dad’s wedding, but. Oh. Steve’s looking right back at him the same way. “Uncle Rhodey?”

“Yeah, kiddo?”

“What was Steve like?”

Rhodey turns to look at her, his face very carefully blank. “What do you mean?”

“I—he and dad were friends, right? Kind of? Before the whole—and I never got to know him. We study him, in school, but that’s not who he was.”

“What do you want to know?”

Morgan pauses, still watching the new footage on the screen. “He was an artist?” she asks, finally, not sure how to put voice to what’s ticking over in her mind. “I saw the sketchbooks that dad kept in the garage.” The reason why her dad had kept them is a whole other question, but Morgan doesn’t know how to ask that.

“He was,” Rhodey says, fingers tracing around the rim of the one glass of scotch he drinks on this day. “Your dad, when they all moved into the tower, Steve didn’t know what to do with himself, and Tony, he never met a problem he didn’t try and fix,” Rhodey smiles, almost to himself. “The way Tony put it, Steve wouldn’t get out of the gym, and Tony knew he’d been an artist, so he got a bunch of supplies delivered to the tower, cleared out a space in his workshop and told Steve to get to work.”

Taking a bite out of a cheeseburger, Morgan sits back on the couch, watching as her mom thanks everyone for coming. She looks tired, older, and Morgan pushes that thought down as hard as she can because she doesn’t want to think about that.

“So they were friends? For real?”

Rhodey looks like he’s struggling to find the words to answer, but eventually he nods. “Yeah. I’d say they were.”

Happy’s watching the screen, and Morgan wants to get his opinion, but he’s got that look on his face that she’s come to know all too well from the adults in her life. The look that says he’s not gonna talk about it without asking her mom first. Sighing, she finishes the cheeseburger and sits back on the couch, watching footage of her dad flit across the screen.

*

Her mom doesn’t get back until late, and Morgan’s meant to be asleep, but instead she’s perched on the edge of the stairs, slightly hidden from view. Uncle Rhodey greets her, tells her Happy’s asleep in one of the guest rooms, and Morgan’s about to come downstairs when—.

“You should know, Morgan was asking about Steve. About Tony and Steve.”

“I—did she ask about—”

“No,” Rhodey says. “But she was thinking it after she saw the tower footage.”

“You think you can read her that well?”

“She’s my best friend’s kid, Pepper, I know everything her face does.”

“I know, I know, sorry, it’s just—” her mom sighs heavily. “Been a day.”

“You want me to stay? I can make pancakes in the morning?”

There’s a rustle of clothing, like her mom and Uncle Rhodey are hugging, and then. “No,” her mom says. “No, I think I’m going to have to have a conversation with her.”

“Call me, if you need to.” The sound of Uncle Rhodey walking to the door floats up to Morgan, and then it stops. “Pepper, why did you put that footage out there? You didn’t need to.”

“Honestly? I’m tired of pretending that I was the only person Tony was in love with when he died.”

Blood rushes through Morgan’s head and she clings to the bannister, barely hearing whatever else her mom and Uncle Rhodey discuss. The door closes, and she hears her mom kick off her shoes—ones dad got her, years ago—and sit at the bottom of the stairs.

She’s crying.

Morgan freezes. It’s not like she hasn’t seen her mom crying before, but this—she’s not sure she should be hearing this. She can’t move, her mom will hear her, but it’s hitting her right in the heart to stay where she is. “Mom?” she calls, softly. “Mom, I—”

“God, Morgan,” Pepper turns around, red rimming her eyes but smiling. “Sorry baby, I didn’t mean to—”

“I heard what you said to Uncle Rhodey,” Morgan says, standing awkwardly at the top of the stairs, pulling her dad’s hoodie down over her hands. “I didn’t mean to, but—”

“Come here,” Pepper says, standing up and holding her arms out. “Come on.”

Morgan rushes down the stairs and falls into her mom’s arms, closing her eyes at the familiar way she strokes a hand over her hair, kisses the top of her head. “I’m sorry,” Morgan whispers.

“There’s nothing to be sorry about.”

They stand there for a long time, her mom holding her tight, Morgan clinging back just as hard, and then Morgan lifts her head. “Was he really in love with Steve?”

“Yes,” Pepper says, not sugarcoating it.

“And you as well?”

“Yes.”

“I don’t—”

“Come, sit down with me,” Pepper says, taking her hand and guiding her to the couch where there’s still cheeseburgers left out. “Cold cheeseburgers,” Pepper says with a half smile. “Just what every woman wants to eat.” Despite her words, she picks one up, unwraps it and bites into it.

Morgan curls her legs underneath her and rests her arm on the back of the couch, and watches her mom eat.

“You know, you look just like him when you sit like that,” she says, her eyes shining a little. “It’s really something.”

“Mom, you don’t have to—”

“No,” her mom says, putting down the wrapper. “I do. You deserve to hear it. You know your dad and I weren’t always together, it was complicated for a long time—”

“Because he was Iron Man?”

“Sometimes,” Pepper says, tilting her head. “Sometimes because relationships are hard, even without superheroes. We took breaks from each other, we loved each other, but life was—” she breaks off and shrugs. “Complicated.”

“Did he and Steve—I mean were they—”

Her mom looks at her for a long time before pressing her lips together and nodding. “They were, they did. Not while Tony and I were, but—. The thing you have to understand about your father is that he had so much love to give. So much. And he loved so much, and so intensely that it could be overwhelming—”

“The giant rabbit.”

“Yes,” Pepper says with a laugh. “Just like that. But he—he never thought he deserved to be loved back. I guess Steve and I both tried to get him to believe that he did, but it wasn’t until you came along that he really understood. He loved you, so very much. More than anything in the world.”

“I remember Steve at the house, I think,” Morgan says. “I—he came for dinner sometimes?”

“He did. A couple of times,” Pepper says. “Not often, but he came to check in, and he—I think he was reassuring himself that he made the right choice to let your dad be your dad. Not—” Pepper sighs. “Nothing could’ve stopped Tony from being your dad. He wanted you, he walked away from fighting for you, he wanted the life we had together, but he—” Pepper presses her fingers to her forehead and closes her eyes. “I don’t know that I should be telling you all this, I don’t know if Tony—”

“Mom,” Morgan interrupts, reaching over and touching her knee. “Please? I just. I want to understand.”

“Okay. I think that if Steve had pushed, your father would’ve gone back to being Iron Man, and Steve made the choice not to push him. He wanted him to be happy, to have a life, so he let him do that.”

“But he came and then dad—”

“Baby, no, your dad made his choices. I don’t know if you remember, but the night your dad worked out time travel? Worked out how to save the world? You were right there with him, sitting on the steps spying on him.”

“I was?”

“And then he taught you how to swear and bribed you with a juice pop to go to bed.”

Morgan laughs, wiping at her eyes furiously. “I was there?”

“You were. Baby, I don’t think Tony could’ve lived with himself if he hadn’t done all he could to save everyone. And then he had to save us, to save you, and he made that choice all on his own as well. Steve might’ve asked, but your dad—he was stubborn. Like you. He wanted to do good. He wanted you to be able to grow up and have a life.”

“Were you ever mad that dad still loved Steve?”

“That’s a hell of a question,” Pepper says, sitting back against the cushions. “I don’t—”

“You don’t have to answer it.”

“No, I—I’ve never thought about it,” Pepper says. “It wasn’t something that I—. I guess I thought that if anyone could be in love with two people at once, it would be Tony. He was always an overachiever.”

“Thank you,” Morgan says quietly. “For telling me.”

“You deserve to know who your dad was,” Pepper says, leaning over and kissing her forehead. “In all his ways. Now, go to bed, please? I’m exhausted and I don’t want you sitting up all night.”

Morgan nods, and gets off the couch, leaning down to hug her mom. “Love you,” she says against her mom’s hair, smiling when her mom whispers it back.

*

When she gets upstairs, Morgan runs her fingers over the helmet before kissing it. “I’m glad you were loved,” she says quietly. “I miss you.”

**Author's Note:**

> for every fellow unwilling member of the dead dad's club.
> 
> fic post on [tumblr](https://gotthesilver.tumblr.com/post/184484899077/new-fic-endgame-coda-so-spoilers)
> 
> fic post on [twitter](https://twitter.com/starstarked/status/1122187483360501760)


End file.
